


Call of the Sirens

by JamesCwho



Series: Season 9 3/4 [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen, Humor, Loss, New Companion, season 9 3/4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-08-25 15:09:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16663144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JamesCwho/pseuds/JamesCwho
Summary: An eerie cry echoes through the city, luring the lost away. Can the mysterious busker who calls himself the Doctor really help Sam Call find her missing friend - or is he leading her into deadly danger? [12th Doctor story set in between 'The Husbands of River Song' and 'The Return of Dr Mysterio' - a 'season opener' set in Glasgow, Scotland in the 1990s and introducing a new companion, Sam Call]





	Call of the Sirens

Doctor Who – Call of the Sirens

Sam was used to the sounds the city made as she moved through its streets. The impatient rumble of double-decker buses, punctuated by the angry screech of a car horn. Muttered words stolen from the conversations of passing strangers, tantalising glimpses of lives of which she was not a part. The wind, brisk and cold today, whistling round the tops of office blocks and shops. And the ever-present keening of a distant siren, announcing that somewhere in the city someone was having an even worse day than she was!

She had spent the morning checking all of Pete’s usual haunts – the train station, bus depot, the newspaper stand next to the city centre’s busiest taxi rank – anywhere the passing foot traffic might result in a few sympathy coins dropped into the old man’s cap. He had been on the streets of Glasgow for so long now that he had the pick of the best spots. The younger ones, runaways mostly, kids who distrusted the whole world, seemed to defer naturally to the old man’s experience. Sam had seen him readily sharing his day’s take to make sure no one was hungrier than they had to be. She too had already given away all of her spare change – not a lot to begin with – into the grateful hands of equally hungry souls she’d found each time she stopped. But no one had seen Pete.

  
The first frosts had hit the city last night and she knew he was too stubborn to take refuge at any of the shelters which gave temporary respite to people who found themselves alone and on the streets – people like Pete. When she reached the last of his usual spots, Sam fought to suppress the worry that welled up inside her when she considered what she might find. The alleyway, nestled between a bank and a restaurant, was sheltered from the worst of the city’s cold nights, but still…

  
When Sam reached the corner her face showed both her relief and disappointment at finding it free from Pete’s familiar tangle of blankets. Instead there was a busker, sitting on the ground with his back against the wall. He didn’t lift his grey-haired head from contemplation of the electric guitar in his lap when she walked further down the lane towards him.

  
“Is that for me?” the busker suddenly asked.

  
“Sorry?” she said, stopping short and looking closely at him. She thought he looked curiously well-dressed and casual at the same time – a dark, heavy coat thrown over a plain white shirt, doc marten boots – he didn’t look like he lived on the streets. For some reason she got the feeling he didn’t really live anywhere – which was daft because she knew nothing about this man at all, except that now he was looking at her expectantly. He lifted his eyebrows – how had she missed those – to emphasise his question.

  
“The coffee.” He nodded towards the polystyrene cups she held in her hands. “I’m not a big fan – it’s like hot chocolate for people who don’t want to enjoy themselves.”

  
“It’s soup.” She told him, “I brought it for a friend of mine, he’s here sometimes.”

  
“Well, seeing as you went to the trouble of getting it.” The busker said, reaching inside his coat and pulling out an unfeasibly large, metal spoon.

  
Sam smiled as she handed the man with the guitar one of the cups. “I’m not sure that will fit in there.”

  
He plunged it in regardless and it emerged with a spoonful which seemed to empty half of the contents of the cup. “Dimensional transcendentalism.” He explained, “Smaller on the outside.”

  
She shook her head, “I’m sorry?” she said.

  
“You keep apologising.” The busker noted, licking the spoon and putting it back in his pocket. He handed her the empty cup. “You don’t have to. It was quite tasty soup, lots of e-numbers and artificial stuff – very 90s!”

  
Not much of what he said made a lot of sense to Sam, but she had spent enough time talking to the people who populated the back alleys of the city to know that they frequently inhabited realities of their own, sometimes frightening and often confusing worlds conjured up from the traumas of their past. She knew it could be difficult to live with a foot in both worlds, the real and the imagined. Sometimes people lost their way.

  
“I don’t suppose you’ve seen my friend Pete, have you?” Sam asked the busker, “He’s an old man, in his seventies at least. He wears a cap from his days in the Navy, uses it to beg for spare change - if you’ve seen him anywhere, I’d be really grateful. It was cold last night.”

  
The busker got to his feet. He turned his back on her and started to walk towards the mouth of the lane, where it met the busy Glasgow streets.

  
“Oh, great!” Sam shouted after him, “Thanks for nothing!”

  
She sighed as she mentally prepared herself for the familiar circuit of the city hospitals and police stations – on cold nights the constables sometimes thought they were doing the homeless a favour, picking them up and locking them in a cell. Sam didn’t think it helped anyone and she didn’t think Pete would go along without a fight; not that the old man could offer much resistance. Finding him in custody would still be better than finding him in a hospital ward, or worse!

  
In the distance she could still hear a siren wailing, a sliver of sound cutting through the cacophony of city noises. Her feet ached and her head throbbed a painful counterpoint to the distant howl.

  
At the mouth of the alley the busker seemed to be having an argument with the old blue Police Box which had occupied the spot for as long as Sam could remember. There were a few of them still scattered around the city, long disused and in various states of disrepair. It was bluer than she remembered and there was something else which was different – the door was open and she was sure she could hear…

  
“Alright! I’ll ask her!” the busker exclaimed suddenly. He turned back to Sam.

  
“I don’t think you’re supposed to mess about with those.” Sam said, stepping closer to try and see what the busker was looking at inside the box.

  
“No. I wouldn’t recommend it. You could end up absolutely anywhere - unless you know what you’re doing.” He smiled a thin sort of smile that might have been an attempt at reassurance by someone who had heard of the concept but wasn’t sure what the point of it was. “Fortunately, I always know what I’m doing!”

  
A snort of derision came from inside the box. The busker looked somewhere between amused and annoyed – although she guessed the eyebrows always made him look a bit angry anyway.

  
“Is there someone in there?” Sam asked, tilting her head to try to see inside. The busker stepped quickly in front of her, halfway into the doorway, blocking her way.

  
“Not entirely.” He said, giving her the thin smile again. “Pass me the guitar?” He nodded to the black instrument propped against the side of the box. She lifted it and passed it to the busker and it disappeared into the box.

  
She heard a muffled cough from somewhere inside. The busker sighed.

  
“And the soup too, if you’re not going to drink it.” Without thinking, she handed the cup of soup to the man, who passed it inside. The busker seemed to treat this box as his own private…what? Shed? Storage locker?

  
“Croutons?” came a voice from inside the box as the busker stepped back into the street.

  
Sam smiled, finally getting it. “Ventriloquism, right? It’s part of the act – the dummy trapped in the box?”

  
“Dummy?” protested an indignant, muffled voice from inside the box, as the busker shut the door.

  
“That’s not bad!” laughed Sam, “Or is it a trick, like a walkie-talkie or something?”

  
“Or something.” The busker confirmed. “I’m the Doctor, by the way.”

  
Sam nodded, “The Doctor! I like it – very mysterious. I’m Sam – Samantha Call.”

  
The busker – the Doctor, she corrected herself – reached out and locked the box, slipping the small silver Yale key back into his pocket. “Okay.” He said, “I’m ready.”

  
She was confused, “Ready? For what?”

  
“To find your friend, Pete. I drank his soup, it seems like the least I can do. Try to keep up and avoid anything that looks too dangerous – it’s been a while since I’ve done saving humans, so I might be out of practice.”

  
He disappeared around the corner. Sam hesitated for a moment, then followed.

 

 

  
The Doctor navigated the crowds in the street by treating them like they weren’t there; maybe they weren’t to him, Sam mused as she watched him plough on ahead of her. He was an unusual one, this Doctor – drainpipe thin legs propelling him like a man with a mission, the hem of his dark navy coat flapping up in a flash of scarlet. He was holding up some sort of pulsing, blue wand, twisting it around like it was a TV antenna and he was trying to find a better signal.

  
And he never stopped talking! The story seemed to be a part of his act, his character – “The Doctor” – apparently an alien and a time-traveller, if she’d followed it all correctly. It was a pretty involved backstory for a street performer! Sam could only follow a fraction of his patter – waveforms and locator pulses, artron energy traces and…something about a river? Did he mean the Clyde? They were heading in the right direction if that’s where he was leading her.

  
There were places down there she hadn’t checked. By the bridges that spanned the river which divided the city in half, but she doubted she’d find Pete there. His days in the Navy had left him with dark, traumatic memories which often plagued him when he saw the murky surface of the Clyde’s waters. Sam had once heard a story about Pete – that he’d been the sole survivor when the ship that he served on had been torpedoed during the war. Pete had floated in the dark, icy waters awaiting rescue, while around him his friends disappeared below the surface, one by one, until he was the last. She had never asked him about it, but she recognised the look a person got in their eyes when they were haunted by the past. She saw it in the mirror every day.

  
The Doctor was frowning at his wand prop, which strobed in waves of intermittent blue and green. Was this part of the act too? Entertaining as it was, they weren’t any closer to finding her missing friend. Perhaps it was time to say goodbye to this Doctor and get back to reality.

  
“Doctor, I think, maybe…” she started, but he wasn’t listening.

  
“Come on, what’s wrong with you?” he was still shouting at his glow-stick. “You’ve tracked her signal across all of time and space, then you go and lose it in ‘90s Glasgow?”

  
“Doctor!” Sam tried again, but he wasn’t listening to her. Her head was throbbing now with a deep, insistent pain that pulsed like the Doctor’s strobe toy. She closed her eyes and rubbed at her temples with her fingers. She could hear that ever-present siren growing louder, drowning everything else out and making her headache worse. She felt dizzy, her legs suddenly choosing that moment to be singularly unsupportive. She was going to pass out.

  
Then she felt herself caught, steadied and held safely by the Doctor. He put his fingertips against her forehead and she felt the pain subside; she could still hear the wail of the siren, but it was muted. A faint call in the distance, fading back into the noise of the traffic and passers-by.

  
“Feeling better?” the Doctor asked.

  
She nodded. She felt oddly secure, supported by this stranger she knew virtually nothing about. Maybe it had just been too long since anyone had looked after her, instead of the other way round. But then she felt stupid and embarrassed and stepped away from him, reaching out her hand to steady herself against a shop window.

  
“I’m okay.” She reassured him. “Just got dizzy. Lost my balance there.”

  
The Doctor was waving his magic wand, with all of its accompanying beeps and buzzing, right in front of her face! Like that was going to help!

  
“Honestly, I’m fine. Just a headache…”

  
“Shhh. No talking. Doctor’s orders!” The Doctor was looking intently at the device in his hand, then back at her.

  
“There’s something. Something I’m missing.” He said. He reached out again and rested a single fingertip on her forehead. It felt cold against her skin.

  
“Doctor!” she protested, “What do you think you’re doing?”

  
He looked intently into her eyes. Was he trying to hypnotise her? She tried to avoid returning the piercing stare.

  
“Hold still – I’m tuning in.” he tapped his own head with the device held in his other hand. “I’m on the wrong frequency. I know there’s something coming through – a signal, a message maybe - but I can’t hear it!”

  
“Hear?” she was lost now, baffled by him, by all of this…weirdness. Angrily, she pushed him away. “All I can hear is that bloody siren!”

  
He looked at her as if he was really seeing her for the first time.

  
“Siren?” he said. “What siren?”

  
She shook her head. “Are you kidding? I’ve been hearing it all morning. I thought it was an ambulance, but it must be an alarm or something because it’s been getting louder the closer we get to it.”

  
The Doctor was smiling that odd smile of his again.

  
“What?” she said, “Did I say something funny?”

  
“You know the old stories about sirens.” He said. “Their song led sailors astray.”

  
He straightened up and cocked his head like he was listening intently for something.

  
“Nope.” He said, “Still nothing. Which direction would you say it was coming from?”

  
Sam listened. The siren blended into the soundscape of the city like cream stirred into coffee – it just seemed like a part of everything around her. She turned slowly on the spot, her eyes closed. Was it louder there? She opened her eyes and pointed.

  
“That way.” She told him, “Towards the river.”

  
“I hope so.” He said.

  
“Sorry?” she didn’t understand. “Are you saying you really can’t hear that?”

  
“I really can’t.” he said, “But don’t you think we should find out why you can?”

 

  
  
Several things struck Sam as unusual as she followed the Doctor through the gloom of a cramped maintenance tunnel. The first was how deserted it had been outside. They’d gained access to the tunnels through a rusted, metal doorway embedded in the brickwork of the railway bridge spanning the river. This was one of the spots she knew where street kids tended to congregate, the arches of the bridge offering some shelter. But today, just like Pete, they were gone. She could see the makeshift dwellings, all cardboard walls and polythene roofs, newspapers for floors. Every one of them empty. Abandoned. It didn’t make any sense to Sam. She knew the people who lived here, or people like them, in places like this all over the country; they held on fiercely to what little they had and let no one take it away from them. So where had they gone?

  
It also troubled her that the Doctor kept calling the siren “she” – did he really believe that there was someone down here in the dark making that noise? It sounded like no voice she’d ever heard – it was too…unrelenting. What could let out such a perpetual scream without pausing to draw breath? She pushed thoughts like that away and concentrated on following the dancing point of pulsing light the Doctor held up before him. He navigated the twists and turns of what she assumed were maintenance tunnels for the railway effortlessly. He seemed to know where he was going - at least they hadn’t hit any dead ends yet. For all she knew they were going round in circles – and that was the strangest thing: why was she following this man into the darkness? Why was she here at all?

  
“So why are you here?” the Doctor echoed her thoughts.

  
“Are you a mind-reader, as well as a ventriloquist and a busker?” she joked.

  
“Only in extreme circumstances.” He turned so that his face was momentarily framed in the eerie, green light. “It gives me migraines like you wouldn’t believe – the kind where you want to teleport your brain to another dimension where pain doesn’t exist. And that doesn’t help as much as you’d think it would.”

  
He was smiling again – in fact the further they went, getting closer to wherever it was they were going, the more excited the Doctor seemed to become. They were heading God knows where, deeper and deeper into the recesses of the City’s subterranean vaults, following a sound he still claimed he couldn’t even hear – and he was enjoying it!

  
“Why are _you_ here?” she asked him suddenly, stopping in her tracks.

  
“Answering a question with another question? Are you a politician?” he replied.

  
“Don’t change the subject – why are you here, Doctor? Why do you even care that my friend is missing in the first place?”

  
He’d stopped at an intersection up ahead and was trying to make his mind up between two near-identical tunnels that headed off in different directions.

  
“Which way?” he asked, looking back at her.

  
She didn’t move. “Answering a question with a question?” she said.

  
She waited. He didn’t say anything for a moment and then he turned back to the tunnels. He stood, silently, shadows shrouding his face like a mourning veil.

  
“I’m looking for someone too.” He said eventually.

  
“Someone you’ve lost?”

  
The Doctor turned towards her and Sam didn’t have to be able to see his face to know this was a question that would hurt too much to answer. And then, he smiled that smile again – you could almost believe he was an alien when his face wore that smile!

  
“Oh, she’ll turn up eventually – she always does.” He motioned a thumb towards the passage on the right hand side. “This way?”

  
Sam shook her head. “I think the sound is coming from the left. And we’re definitely getting closer – or it’s getting closer to us!”

  
“You are so Glaswegian.” He told her. “Scottishness squared!”

  
“Why can I hear this siren and you can’t? Is there something wrong with me?” Sam asked, as she followed him down the left-hand tunnel.

  
“I don’t know.” He said, “Maybe there’s something right with you. Maybe there’s something wrong with me. I usually just try to enjoy the not-knowing things part – it never lasts very long.”

  
They reached the end of the passageway, stopping at a metal doorway similar to the one through which they’d entered the tunnels. The Doctor stopped and lifted his hand, placing it palm flat to the surface of the door. When he didn’t make any move to open the door Sam reached out and touched it with her fingers – the metal was warm and was it…yes, it was vibrating.

  
“Could be a side effect. Sympathetic vibrations?” the Doctor speculated, “Or maybe we’ve just discovered Glasgow’s secret underground rave scene!”

  
Sam shook her head. “It’s hot – like there’s a fire on the other side of the door! We should get help in case someone is hurt.”

  
The Doctor waved his device up and down in front of the door.

  
“It’s not locked.” He announced, pulling on the handle. The door opened with the long, grinding screech of metal on metal.

  
Sam was relieved to see there were no flames behind the door and doubly relieved that the passageway opened out into a larger space beyond. They emerged into a long, low room – some kind of storage space by the looks of it, as they had to push their way past heavy crates stacked near the doorway. It was dark inside. Sam found a light switch on the wall and flicked it back and forth a few times hopefully, but it made no difference.

  
“Can you still hear the siren?” the Doctor whispered to her.

  
“Yeah, like it’s coming from all around us.” Strangely, it didn’t seem any louder. Something occurred to her, “Why are we whispering?”

  
“Would you believe me if I said it was for dramatic effect?” he poked his head up over the top of a stack of boxes, peering into the murk. Before she could answer he pointed his wand thing towards the ceiling and pressed a button. Along the length of the roof, filaments in bulbs which hadn’t seen use in decades began to glow dimly, accompanied by an alarming buzz and the acrid smell of burning dust. As the pale light began to displace the darkness, Sam could see a group of people in the centre of the room. They were gathered around something, as if huddled together beside a fire for warmth. Sam couldn’t see any flames, but there was something moving at the centre of the group – a seething shape, like a swirling column of dust or dark smoke.

  
“I think we’ve found your siren.” The Doctor said.

  
As the lights grew stronger Sam could make out the figure of her friend Pete, at the front of the crowd, the old man staring straight ahead into the whirling black cloud. His face looked transfixed, like he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the roiling mass. All of the people, homeless kids for the most part she thought, were staring at the dark shape like it was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen.

  
“What…what is that?” she looked at the Doctor’s face. He was staring intently at the shape too, but his expression was one of curiosity.

  
“Something I can see!” he shouted, suddenly springing forward from their hiding place. “Something I can scan!”

  
Brandishing the familiar glowing wand device before him as he advanced towards the shadowy figure at the centre of the room, the Doctor almost danced on the spot with excitement.

  
“Oh, you have been busy little bees, haven’t you?” he said, “Buzzing around and kicking up all this dust. Are you trying to disguise yourselves? Or just to communicate? It’s more of a mess than a message, but you’re giving it your best. I admire that kind of effort in a seemingly sentient, almost certainly extra-dimensional and hopefully non-aggressive lifeform.”

  
The dust cloud rose up until it dwarfed the Doctor, its shape constantly shifting, like a shadow trying to be something else, something more substantial. From her hiding place Sam watched it shrink back down, the black dust coalescing into an almost human form similar in size to the Doctor.

  
“That’s it!” the Doctor said in the encouraging tone a parent might use to a toddler taking its first steps. “Arms, legs, head – try for some vocal chords and let’s really get this show on the road!”

  
The thing reached out with what seemed to be becoming an arm, grasping for the device in the Doctor’s hand, only to crumble away as it made contact. A shudder ran through the creature and it dissolved into a dark cloud which hung in the air for a second before collapsing to the ground. Individual motes of dust caught the light as they gently floated to the floor.

  
“No! No – you nearly had it!” the Doctor cried out.

  
Sam emerged from behind the crates and immediately ran to Pete’s side. She hugged him tightly in relief and when she didn’t feel any response she looked into his face. That same expression of transfixed awe radiated from his unseeing eyes.

  
“Doctor!” she shouted, “It’s Pete – there’s something wrong with him!”

  
The Doctor ignored her. He seemed to be speaking to the empty air now.

  
“I get it – new dimensional plane, no physical form, you do the best you can with what you’ve got. Scare a few locals, attract the attention of someone you might be able to communicate with. But it worked, I’m here – talk to me!”

  
“What are you doing?” Sam shouted at him, “These people need help!”

  
He waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the assembled mass of mesmerized people.

  
“Basic psychically-induced trance state. It’s probably a side-effect of whatever the Sirens did to call them here. I doubt it’s intentional – or harmful in the long-term. All this dust could give you a shocking dose of bronchitis though!”

  
“The sirens?” she felt like she was coming undone, like the world was unravelling around her and the only solid thing she could hold onto was this man who seemed to understand more than anyone else what the hell was going on!

  
“I like it. It’s mythic. Might add a silent P though. Psirens!” He gestured with one hand like he was writing the word in the air. “No, that’s rubbish. Keep it simple, eh?”

  
“The dust thing? What was that? Where did it go?” she was aware that she was hurling a barrage of questions at him, but questions were all she had.

  
The Doctor looked at her. “Go? They didn’t go anywhere – they just took their clothes off!” He knelt down on one knee and picked up a handful of dust. “Some sort of psychokinetic excitation of stray particles of matter.” He blew the dust out of his palm, like a conjuror performing a trick.

  
“Basically, they made themselves a dust suit.” He explained when Sam seemed none the wiser.

  
“But what are they? Is this something that lives beneath the river? Was it a ghost?”

  
The Doctor stood up and brushed the remaining dust from his hands.

  
“Why is it you lot always think anything you don’t understand is a ghost? Why would it be a ghost? Ooh here’s a strange, shadowy shape forming out of the very fabric of the earth, trying to take physical form and make first contact with humanity and what do you do? Call Ghostbusters. You’d be better off with Dustbusters!” His rant had taken him round the room until he was face to face with Sam, a scathing expression topped off with the world’s most ferocious eyebrows. “No, it’s _not_ a ghost!”

  
“Then what is it? You seem to know so much!” She was growing angry with him now, “What is it and what has it done to these people?”

  
The Doctor turned towards the spellbound group. He waved a hand in front of Pete’s face. The expression of contentment on it didn’t change.

  
“What are you seeing, my friend?” the Doctor asked him. “Something nice, I hope.”

  
“Doctor!” Sam shouted from behind him.

  
“Wait a minute!” the Doctor said suddenly. He stared directly into Pete’s eyes, his own face only millimetres from the old man’s. “What _are_ you seeing?”

  
“Doctor!” Sam shouted, “It’s coming back!”

  
At the Doctor’s feet dust was stirring, rising in a tight spiral, until it formed a figure behind his back. It loomed over him, a massive club-like limb taking shape, poised to smash down upon the oblivious Doctor.

  
Sam grabbed the long wooden handle of a broom that lay discarded on the floor and swung it in a desperate arc towards the creature. It intersected with the hastily constructed body, dust flying everywhere as Sam’s makeshift weapon effectively bisected the Doctor’s attacker.

  
Dustbuster! Alright!

  
She didn’t feel so helpless now. As she pulled the broom handle back for another swing, she watched the Doctor spin around, a look of horror on his face.

  
“No! What are you doing?” he shouted, “Thousands of years of trying to teach you idiots the basics of diplomacy and your first reaction to anything unusual is to hit it with a big stick!”

  
“It was about to attack you!” she explained, “You’re welcome by the way!”

  
The Doctor gave her a withering stare and turned to examine the wounded creature. It writhed on the spot, thin tendrils of dust reaching out between its two separated halves, struggling to be whole. Sam felt a pang of pity for the thing, watching as the Doctor ran his device along the length of the wound, as if he really was a doctor. She heard a noise coming from the creature, a deep resonant growl which echoed around the room.

  
“It’s in pain!” she said. Kneeling down next to the Doctor, Sam instinctively reached out a hand to comfort the creature as if it was a wounded animal. Her fingers went right through the dust which made up its skin and she pulled her hand back. Her own skin tingled where she’d touched the creature, but apart from being streaked with thick, black dust her hand seemed unharmed.

  
The Doctor looked at her, the disappointment gone from his eyes, replaced with something else that might have been the beginnings of respect.

  
“I don’t think that’s a cry of pain.” The Doctor reassured her, “I think it’s trying to vocalise!”

  
**NNNNNNNN**

  
The sound seemed to come not only from the creature, but from all around them. It was like the whole room was resonating with the deep, low rumble coming from the Siren. The Doctor reached out and took Sam’s hand. He pressed it to the cold stone floor. Sam could feel the very foundations vibrating.

  
**NNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEE**

  
“Come on!” the Doctor encouraged the creature, “You can do it – I’ll have a consonant, please Carol!”

  
**NNNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEDDDDDDD**

  
“Need!” Sam shouted, “It’s saying it needs something – what does it need?” She found she had a sudden urge to help the creature if she could. If it wasn’t too late. The sound dissipated, the last vibrations dying out along with it.

  
“I’m guessing that whatever it needs, that’s why your friend was drawn here. Maybe he and the others have something the sirens need.” The Doctor theorised.

  
“How do you know it isn’t still dangerous?” she asked him.

  
The Doctor frowned, “We don’t know that it ever was. Maybe this is just another tourist – passing through.”

  
“A tourist? Passing through from where?” Sam was beginning to feel lost again. It was all too much, too strange to comprehend. Her eyes widened in realisation, “Is this an alien?”

  
The Doctor smiled, “I don’t think it’s a native Glaswegian, if that’s what you’re asking!”

  
“Can you help it?” Sam asked. Somewhere amid the chaos of the last few minutes she had developed the belief that if anyone could help – help her friend, help this creature and, hopefully, help her escape this madness – it was the Doctor!

  
The Doctor looked at her and then down at the creature.

  
“Now you’re asking the right questions, Sam Call.” he said. He started to adjust the controls on his device.

  
“That’s not a prop, is it?” Sam asked him, “And you’re not a street performer.”

  
He didn’t look up. “It’s called a sonic screwdriver. I’m using it – trying to use it – to boost the strength of the harmonics the sirens are using to communicate with us.”

  
A deep thrumming started to build, emanating in waves from the ground beneath their feet. It was like standing on the skin of a sub-woofer turned up to 11. Sam could feel her back teeth starting to ache.

  
**NNNNNEEEEEDDDDD**

  
“Yes we know that bit…” shouted the Doctor over the booming words, “...need what? Transport? Technology? A hug?”

  
**FFFFFOOOOODDDDD**

 

“Food? It needs food?” Sam started to back away from the shape on the ground.

  
“Apparently.” Said the Doctor.

  
“What does it eat?” she asked him, her eyes widening with realisation. “Does it eat people? Are we the food?”

  
The Doctor shrugged. “Maybe it’s just heard of the wonder that is the deep fried Mars bar. And if that’s not a thing yet, remind me to invent it before I leave.”

  
The thing on the ground suddenly lost all cohesion, crumbling into nothing but a dark black shape outlined against the stone.

  
“Is it dead?” Sam asked tentatively, wondering at the same time if she hoped it was.

  
“No but I think we should…” Sam never heard the Doctor finish. She felt a build-up of pressure in the small room, her ears popped and she held her hands to her temples – it felt like a giant fist was crushing the life out of her body!

  
“Doctor!” she managed to say, before the black spots at the edge of her vision merged to become a blanket of darkness which engulfed her.

 

  
  
Sam Call awoke to the sound of…she wasn’t sure what – it sounded like breathing? But it was coming from all around her, as if she’d been swallowed up by something impossibly huge. She was afraid of what she might see if she opened her eyes – she wasn’t sure she was ready for any more of the strangeness which seemed to have become her life. She lay still and listened intently. Sam could hear a man’s voice she didn’t recognise.

  
“I’m a fan of out-of-body experiences, generally…” it was saying, “but I could lend more of a hand if I actually had some!”

  
Then Sam heard another voice, the Doctor’s voice. He was speaking to the other man.

  
“What are you talking about? You’ve got hands – there are half a dozen lying around in my workshop waiting for you to pick a pair!”

  
“I’d grown quite fond of my original ones, Sir, if you don’t mind.” The voice replied. “We’ve been through a lot together.”

  
“Are you sure? The bionic one from Janus Prime has a staple remover built into the thumb.”

  
The surreal conversation did nothing to reassure Sam that she was safe. She was even more certain now that she didn’t want to see whatever waited for her when she opened her eyes. But if she wanted to get out of here…

  
She could see lights dancing in the darkness above her, a ring of smooth silver metal with strange symbols, spinning slowly. She was lying on a hard metal floor, but it felt warm to the touch and pulsed with life. The Doctor stood with his back to her, toggling switches and pulling levers on the surface of some kind of machine. She couldn’t see the man he’d been talking to before.

  
“I think the human soup girl is waking up.” She heard the unknown voice say.

  
Human soup? That didn’t sound good – that didn’t sound like something she wanted to be! Sam sat up and let out a yelp of panic when she saw where the voice was coming from.

  
It was a head – a human head! A bald, disembodied human head, wearing glasses and smiling at her!

  
“Hello!” it said cheerily from the surface of the console the Doctor was operating.

  
“Meet Nardole.” The Doctor said, “He’s usually a bit taller than this. He needs to pull himself together.” He aimed for a disarming smile and missed.

  
“Tea and a sit down, miss?” the head asked. It nodded towards a high-backed armchair where a cup of tea steamed invitingly on a little wooden side-table. There were shortbread biscuits resting on the side of the saucer!

  
Sam said nothing and tried to avoid looking at the head and the reassuring smile it gave her, as she got up from the floor and made her way to the chair. Inside her brain was screaming at her: “A head! He has a disembodied head! And it talks – and makes tea!”

  
“How does a head make tea?” she said when she finally spoke.

  
“Well…” began the head.

  
The Doctor interrupted, “I find it’s better not to ask how Nardole gets things done. Or anything about him really.”

  
“Charming!” said the head of Nardole. Sam wondered what had happened to the rest of Nardole and what was going to happen to her!

  
“So…” said the Doctor, turning to Sam, “you’re probably wondering…”

  
Sam held up a hand and the Doctor stopped talking. She lifted the teacup from the saucer and took a sip. She sighed – it was amazing how much better this one little bit of normality made her feel.

  
“Good tea, Nardole.” She said. She looked up at the Doctor.

  
“Okay,” she said, “now I’m ready.”

  
The Doctor looked at her. “Yes I think you might be.” He spun a monitor screen attached to the console round to face Sam. On it she could see an aerial map of the city.

  
“The TARDIS is searching for the energy signature of the Sirens. When they fled the tunnel under the river the surge in power was strong enough to get a trace, but not a lock. So my question is: how would you find them?” He stood waiting expectantly. Was this a test?

  
Sam put down her tea.

  
“My question first.” She told him, “Where is my friend Pete and what the hell is a TARDIS?”

  
“That’s two questions.” Pointed out Nardole helpfully.

  
Sam ignored him and stared at the Doctor.

  
“Pete was the old-looking one, Popeye the sailor man?” he adjusted some controls on his sonic screwdriver and pointed it at the monitor. A purple dot appeared on the map, moving slowly towards the top right corner, always in a straight line.

  
“There you go. Safe and sound.” The Doctor told her. “When the Sirens left the tunnels all of the people just started to wander back up to the surface, including your friend. I had Nardole pick us up in the TARDIS, since you’d decided you were sleepy.”

  
“There’s that word again – what’s a TARDIS?” she asked.

  
The Doctor gestured vaguely with his arm in a motion which might indicate that a TARDIS was the machine, the room or even the arm itself.

  
“This is the TARDIS – my ship – we’re in it. Welcome aboard!”

  
Sam got up from the chair. She looked around the room, taking in the scale of it for the first time. There were other levels besides the one where they stood, staircases leading up to what looked like a library and down to the bowels of the…ship?

  
“Ship? A Space ship? I’m on a space ship? Are we in space?” said Sam as the reality of her situation began to sink in. Then something else occurred to her. “Why does it smell like cinnamon? Is that an alien thing?”

  
The Doctor grimaced. “Nardole was making donuts, apparently.”

  
The head smiled apologetically, “I had a bit of trouble with the holes.”

  
“I told you – better not to ask.” said the Doctor, shaking his head.

  
“We’re short of time and I am prone to boredom, so I’ll summarise: this is a space ship and also a time ship, it’s thousands of years old, bigger on the inside and currently smells like a Starbucks in December. We travel through time and space looking for adventure and helping people. Any questions?”

  
Sam nodded, “Why does that chalkboard have _Happily Ever After_ written on it?”

  
“It’s a mission statement.” the Doctor fired back. He walked to the door and turned to face her.

  
“I’m here to help. Whatever led your friend down into those tunnels is still in your city. We don’t know what it wants. We don’t know how to find it. But we can’t let an alien lifeform just go wandering around in Glasgow – anything could happen to it!”

  
He looked intently into Sam’s eyes.

“In or out?” he asked, “Time is pressing.”

  
For a second or two Sam enjoyed the possibility that she may just have lost her grip on sanity and that none of this was real. But the busking alien and his beheaded butler travelling through space and time in search of adventures? She didn’t think her imagination could have cooked him up. The alternative, however horrific, was that this was real! Whatever the Sirens were – dust monsters or aliens from outer space – they were real and they were here and Pete was somehow mixed up in it all.

  
“You said we don’t know where they’ve gone?” she asked the Doctor. “How did your scanner thing find Pete?”

  
He shook his head. “I thought of that. Whatever the Sirens did to gather those people, it left trace energies behind in their minds. But they’re just traces – I can’t track it back to wherever the Sirens are now!”

  
Sam moved over to the console and pointed to the purple dot still moving slowly across the map of the city.

  
“You said this was Pete. Can you show the other people too? The ones from the tunnel?” she asked.

  
The Doctor turned a dial on the side of the scanner and more purple dots appeared on the screen. Like the dot which represented her missing friend, the others seemed to Sam to be moving slowly, but unerringly in a single direction. Sam pointed a finger at the spot where all of the dots would inevitably converge.

  
“Ooh clever!” said Nardole. “Follow the people, not the signal. You would have thought of that if you were more of a people person!”

  
The Doctor shrugged, “Most of my best friends have been people.”

  
Sam tried not to wonder what the rest of his friends were. Then she realised where all the dots on the screen were heading.

  
“Doctor! I know where they’re going!” she announced. “The Necropolis.”

  
Being only a head seemed to amplify the effect of the expressions on Nardole’s face. He stared at the screen with a look of dread written across his features.

  
“I don’t suppose that translates as _Land of kittens and candyfloss_?” he asked.

  
The Doctor punched a few buttons on the console panel and flung a heavy switch upwards. The central part of the console began to move and Sam heard the breathing noise rise into a wheezing groan. She gripped the edge of the TARDIS console tightly.

  
“Necropolis.” said the Doctor, “The city of the dead – and that’s just where we want to go!”

 

  
  
It was approaching twilight as the Doctor and Sam emerged from his ship on the summit of a hill overlooking the city. Weather-beaten gravestones, some still cared for but most long forgotten, surrounded them on every side. Stone statues stood like sentries, watching over the final resting places of the rich and powerful, the once famous and the fallen heroes of a century past.

  
“Humans!” said the Doctor, gesturing towards the monuments. “You build cities for your dead while the living sleep on the streets!”

  
Sam wasn’t listening to him. She was staring at the blue Police Box standing in the shadow of a particularly large, grey stone mausoleum. As she’d followed the Doctor towards the doors of his ship, Sam had noted the black electric guitar resting against the inside of the whitewashed wooden doors with the small glass windows. She’d recognised the design even before she read the words POLICE BOX visible, though reversed, above the door.

  
So she knew – she just knew – that when she walked out of the Doctor’s ship she was walking out of that battered, blue Police Box. And while her eyes confirmed it, her mind told her it was impossible!

As the doors closed behind them, Sam had felt compelled to reach out and touch the wooden surface of the box. She could feel the painted surface beneath her fingertips, the smoothness broken occasionally by a brushstroke gone awry in the hands of some unknown painter. The reality of that – something so ordinary and at the same time so unbelievable – was difficult to reconcile. She could not imagine the Doctor popping out to give his TARDIS a fresh coat of weather-proof gloss, like your grandad sprucing up the garden shed on a lazy Sunday afternoon. All that…weirdness was still crammed in there behind those blue doors, just waiting to spring out like a Jack-in-the-Box!

  
Sam turned away from the TARDIS with a shudder. Even being in a deserted cemetery as night was falling was something of a relief, until you remembered you were there waiting on an alien lifeform that liked to dress up as a dust monster and abduct your friends.  
“We’ve got company.” said the Doctor. And those were definitely not words you wanted to hear in a graveyard!

  
Slowly but implacably, shambling figures were climbing the hill towards the Doctor and Sam. In the tunnels below the river there had been a handful of mesmerised street people, but now the call of the Sirens had created a legion. Hundreds of people: men, women, teenagers and even children – their faces registering no emotion, their eyes fixed and staring – marched like an army of the lost towards the summit where the mausoleum waited.

  
The Doctor held his sonic screwdriver up in the air like a beacon. It flared with pulses of green and blue light into the darkening sky. To Sam he seemed like a skeleton king leading a demented danse macabre through the trail of tombstones towards the grey steps of the tomb.

  
“They’re becoming more powerful if they can do this!” the Doctor called to her. “Stay close. Generally there’s running at some point.”

  
Sam edged closer to the Doctor. Under the stone archway of the mausoleum entrance, a pair of carved angels stared mournfully at Sam as the Doctor pulled the black iron gates open.

  
“What are you doing?” Sam almost shouted at him, “We’re not going in there!”

  
The Doctor paused in the entranceway. “Well that’s where this lot are headed. The Siren’s song is calling them – all of them – to this place. That’s one strong signal – in fact…”

  
He adjusted the settings on his sonic screwdriver and the air suddenly lit up. Like a million tiny blue fireflies dancing in formation, the lights floated over the heads of the mesmerised people and formed a path through the air only to disappear into the yawning blackness of the tomb.

  
“What is that?” gasped Sam.

  
“The Sirens, whatever they really are, have no physical form but they do emit an energy. It’s what put all these people into a trance state, what called them here – this is the song of the Sirens made visible.”

  
“It’s beautiful!” said Sam. She couldn’t help smiling.

  
“Yes.” The Doctor agreed. “That’s exactly what the fly thinks before the Venus fly trap snaps shut!”

  
He ducked under the archway and descended into the dark passageway. Sam took one look back at the sleepwalking figures converging on the tomb and followed him inside.

  
The pale blue glow that hung in the air above them illuminated the vault into which they emerged – a stark space unadorned except by raised oblongs of stone on which opulent caskets still rested, covered now by dust and grime. The Doctor traced the shimmering trail with his sonic screwdriver held aloft, like he was carefully threading an infinitely small needle. He stopped suddenly at the far end of the vault.

  
“There’s something here.” he said ominously.

  
“Lots of somethings!” shouted Sam as, one by one, the Sirens’ mesmerised victims pushed through the entrance and began to fill the vault.

  
The Doctor shook his head. “No – there’s something _here_!”

He drew his sonic screwdriver through the air where the trail ended – and ripped a hole in the world! That’s how it seemed to Sam. It was as if the Doctor had peeled back the skin of reality and revealed what lay underneath! A howling chaos of sound and light, a dark, whirling vortex of energy! It was brilliant! It was terrifying!

  
“What…what is that?” she said, stepping closer and reaching out a hand towards the ragged-edged portal that hung in the air above the Doctor.

“Their way home. I think.” said the Doctor. “But something’s wrong.”

  
Sam wished she’d been more interested in science at school and wondered if that would even have helped. She could see how the trail of blue Siren energy seemed to stream toward the opening, only to be repelled back into the vault.

  
“Theory: something powerful ripped open a tear between our dimension and another. The Sirens came through, either on purpose or by accident, but now they can’t return.” The Doctor frowned. “She does like a tomb, but I don’t think she’d be this careless!”

  
“The Siren is a _she_?” said Sam, confused.

  
“I think the Siren is a _they_.” replied the Doctor. “Never mind the she, right now. I need more information – they spoke to us before, maybe we can speak to them.” He turned to face the assembled crowd who had now spilled out of the doorway to encompass most of the space in the vault.

  
“Stop!” he cried out, holding a hand up in the air.

  
Like wind-up toys that needed their keys turned, the shambling figures slowly came to a halt.

  
“I really didn’t expect that to work.” the Doctor confided to Sam. “Better think of something to say…any ideas?”

  
Sam just looked at him and shook her head slowly.

  
“It’s okay…I’ve got this!” he reassured her. He took a step forward towards the assembled mass.

  
“FOOD!” he shouted. “You said you needed food. But not us, not meaty treats like humanity. Oh no – you meant energy! You need all these people because you’re harvesting some kind of energy from them…something you think you need to travel back through that portal. Am I right?”

  
A rumbling sound began to fill the chamber. Sam could feel the stone around her throbbing with vibrations.

  
“No – no not that old trick! You’ll bring this place crashing down around us!” cried the Doctor. “The people – use the people to talk to us.”

  
Suddenly the glowing blue trail broke apart into a buzzing swarm of light that filled the room before descending on the crowd standing in front of the Doctor. Their eyes blazed with an intense blue like something out of a horror movie, but even more disconcerting was the way their mouths hung open as the words of the Sirens spilled from them in a cacophony of voices.

  
**We need. Food here. Food strong. We consume. Go back. Leave here.**

  
The Doctor smiled at the possessed crowd. “That’s very kind of you. And very succinct too – and as long as taking your food doesn’t harm these humans, then go in peace.”

  
**Not enough. Not strong. Need more. Strongest food. This one.**

  
Tendrils of deep blue light reached out from the possessed crowd, snaking toward the Doctor and Sam. The Doctor held his sonic device out like a shield in front of him, but Sam was already wrapped in a glowing cocoon of light.

  
“Sam!” the Doctor shouted.

  
“It’s okay!” she cried, “It doesn’t hurt. I don’t think they want to hurt me. I can see…”

  
Suddenly she let out a cry.

  
“What are you doing to her?” the Doctor shouted. Let her go! Take me if you need someone to feed on!”

  
**Need strongest. Her strongest. Not you. Much food. Strongest food.**

  
“Doctor…” gasped Sam, “I can see…everyone…everyone I’ve lost. My mother. My brother!”

  
The Doctor reached out and placed his hands on Sam’s face. Tears streamed down her cheeks, pale skin turning red. Fresh grief darkened her deep brown eyes.

  
**We consume. We strong.**

  
“Emotions!” the Doctor cried out. “Sam – they’re feeding on emotions, your feelings of grief, of loss. That’s who the Sirens were calling…people who have felt a profound loss. People like your friend, people like you.”

  
“It’s too much!” Sam wept, “Like losing them all over again!”

  
“Hold on!” the Doctor insisted, “Sam, hold on to them. Hold on to that feeling, that broken glass in your stomach feeling you get when you realise…when you finally realise that they are gone and they are not coming back! And you are going to have to find some way to live with the reality that they are never coming back!”

  
With a cry of anguish Sam collapsed into the Doctor’s arms as the cage of light that held her dissolved into a swirling swarm once more.

The Sirens shone with their stolen energies, rushing towards the tear in space that promised to deliver them from their enforced exile.

  
“No!” the Doctor shouted. He pointed his sonic screwdriver at the widening spatial rift and the edges started to close as if being pulled together by two invisible hands.

  
**We strong. We go.**

  
A million tiny points of light twisted in the air and Sam had to squeeze her eyes shut tightly as a maelstrom of dust and dirt assaulted them.

  
“Not yet!” the Doctor told them. “You strong. But there’s information I still need. What caused this breach? Tell me and I’ll keep the rift open long enough for you all to go back where you came from.”

  
**Not tell. We show.**

  
The Siren energies coalesced into a shape in the air in front of the Doctor. Sam watched in awe as they sculpted images from light itself, telling their story. She could see an image of this place, the vault, with two figures standing where she and the Doctor were standing right now. One of the figures – a tall, thin man - she didn’t recognise, but the other she had been waiting fifteen years to see again!

  
“Sean!” she cried out. “Doctor – that’s my brother! How can that be Sean?”

  
The Doctor didn’t answer. He was staring intently at the scene. He watched the Sirens’ lightshow as the figure of the man in the scene grabbed Sam’s brother and threw him against the wall of the vault. The man held up a gun – a strangely shaped silver weapon, like something out of a space film – pointing it at Sean Call. Sam watched in horror as the gun’s barrel erupted with energy. She watched the image of her brother clutching desperately at his wrist. And then, in a sudden blaze of light, Sean and his attacker disappeared!

  
“A vortex manipulator?” the Doctor muttered. “Why would he have her vortex manipulator?”

  
Sam let out an anguished cry and reached out, trying to hold onto the image of her brother. But the scene simply dissolved at her touch, breaking into a myriad of tiny points of light. Sean Call was gone.

  
The air teemed with the angry presence of the Sirens.

  
**We show. You see. We go. Go now.**

  
The Doctor pointed the sonic screwdriver at the closing rift and it began to widen. The light of the Sirens whirled around the vault like a dervish one last time before being swept through the portal into the chaos of the void beyond. The edges of the rift came together and just like that the world was whole again!

  
Sam stared at the empty air where the image of her lost brother had hung only seconds before, tears stinging her eyes. She had questions of her own for the Doctor now. It couldn’t all be a coincidence: meeting the Doctor, stopping the Sirens and now this! The image the Sirens had shown them – was it the answer…finally? She had searched so long for any trace of her missing brother. Had she really just seen his final moments?

  
She turned to see the Doctor addressing the assembled crowd that filled the vault, waking now and very confused.

  
“Time for you all to go too.” The Doctor told them. “Go to your home, if you have one. Go to the places you are safe. Go to the people you love. Remember those you have lost!”

  
As one by one they started to leave, the people still looked confused but the blankness had gone from their eyes now that the influence of the Sirens was gone.

  
“They’re still a bit suggestible.” The Doctor explained to Sam. “They’ll drift back into their lives and probably forget that this ever happened.”

  
“I won’t forget.” Sam told him with a determined look in her eyes. “And I have questions for you, Doctor - when you’re ready to explain what that was we saw.”

  
The Doctor regarded her with a strange, contemplative expression on his face.

  
“You said that was your brother – the young man with the hi-tech gadget on his wrist?” he asked her.

  
She nodded. “He disappeared when I was a little girl. I’ve spent all of my adult life looking for him – tracking any lead I could find, all of them dead ends!”

  
Sam looked at the Doctor with a look of grim acceptance on her face. “Did I really just see my brother…is he gone?”

  
The Doctor nodded, “Gone? Yes…but where has he gone? That is the big question. Where has that Artron eruption swept him away to? And why does he have a vortex manipulator anyway?”

  
He gave her a long quizzical look.

  
“I think, Sam Call, that you and I should have a chat about your brother.” he said when he finally spoke.

  
Sam brushed the dust from her hands.

  
“Then you’d better get Nardole to stick the kettle on, Doctor.” she told him. “I think we’re going to have a lot to talk about.”

 

 

**COMING SOON – Doctor Who: Time and Tide**

  
The future of the Earth hangs in the balance – and the Doctor refuses to help!

  
When Sam and the Doctor travel to the 31st century they find humans and Silurians working together to harness the energy of the Sun. But with an obsessed human scientist driven to succeed in her solar experiments no matter the danger and a Silurian terrorist cell determined to put a permanent end to human/Silurian cooperation – all life on Earth faces extinction unless the Doctor can do something to stop that happening.

  
So why is he suddenly so reluctant to get involved?

  
Sam must quickly adapt to the bizarre turn her life has taken, while at the same time trying to work out what the Doctor isn’t telling her – before it’s too late for humanity!

A new original Doctor Who – Season 9 ¾ story by JamesCwho **coming soon**!


End file.
